


What Did You Think A Tiger Shark Was

by Zee



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Friendship, Fun New Friend Times in an Aquarium, Future Fic, Gen, Hanging Out
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-06
Updated: 2017-03-06
Packaged: 2018-09-28 17:18:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,733
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10141247
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zee/pseuds/Zee
Summary: Phichit and Yurio find themselves at loose ends together when their flight out of Skate Canada gets canceled.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [platoapproved](https://archiveofourown.org/users/platoapproved/gifts).



> Commissioned by platoapproved, who wanted Phichit and Yurio spending an afternoon hanging out together. Thank you so much for giving me the excuse to write these two together :D
> 
> The title references this tweet: https://twitter.com/murrman5/status/536703282073575425?lang=en Which I could not quite work into the fic itself, but you should assume that "What did you think a tiger shark was, Yurio" is part of the canon of this story.
> 
> This is set a couple of years after season one canon.

Phichit was not at his best. He’d grabbed only a few hours of sleep between last night’s celebration and the taxi to the Toronto airport this morning, and he’d now been waiting four hours as his flight was delayed again and again before they finally canceled it. An entire morning spent drinking overpriced airport coffee and hunting for outlets to charge his phone while listening to an announcer apologetically explain each further delay had drained the reserves of composure he usually relied on while traveling. He’d been rescheduled, finally, for a flight tomorrow, so at least now he could go back to the hotel and sleep the rest of the day away. He felt bedraggled, grainy-eyed and in need of four showers. 

He missed Yurio at first. He was absorbed in his phone, texting Yuuri a glum update on his travel situation while also reading a flurry of messages from Guang Hong about some drama that apparently went down with Michele last week. Then he heard his name, snarled out in a louder, angrier voice than he usually heard it. Phichit looked up and saw Yurio leaning against the wall between the magazine shop and a vending machine for cosmetics, looking full of rage as usual.

“You’re also stuck here?” Yurio could somehow take a question about their mutual airport situation and turn it into a vehement accusation. Phichit felt a smile tug at the corner of his lips. 

“Yurio, hi! Yeah, they had to put me on a flight tomorrow morning. Same for you?”

Yurio made a noise of disgust and pushed away from the wall, stalking over with as much haughtiness as he could bring to bear while dragging a leopard print rolling suitcase. “This is bullshit. Toronto sucks.”

One of the things Phichit liked about being a figure skater was the opportunity to travel and see so many different places, but he didn’t have much to say right now in defense of Toronto’s charms. “Detroit’s so close, too,” he said ruefully. “Compared to where you’re headed, anyway. Come here.”

Yurio’s scowl went scowlier but he complied, inching himself within grabbing range. Phichit pulled him closer and held up his phone, grinning and flashing a peace sign as he snapped a selfie mid-Yuri’s indignant “hey!”

“What should the caption be? How about ‘found a kitty stuck in snow at the toronto airport.’” Phichit was already typing, and he expected Yurio to keep yelling at him or knock the phone out of his hands or something, but all he said was, “You better show that to me before posting.”

Phichit obliged, handing over his phone. It wasn’t the most flattering picture of Yurio, taken mid-irate yell, but then Yurio looked furious in a good 85% of his instagram feed. He sniffed his approval, hitting post and then handing Phichit his phone back.

“Got any suggestions for tourist-y shit we could do? You seem like you’d enjoy that sort of thing.”

Phichit blamed the sleep deprivation for how slow he was on the uptake. From the impatient, expectant way Yurio was looking at him, he now realized that Yurio was assuming they would spend the day together. Phichit wasn’t opposed to that idea, but he was a little surprised, given that they’d never really hung out without Yuuri around. But then it had long been obvious that Yurio wasn’t nearly as antisocial as he tried to come across, so maybe he just didn’t want to spend an unexpectedly free day alone.

“So tourist-y shit, but it has to be indoors, because like hell am I getting snowed on.” Phichit had already googled their question, and Yuri looked over his shoulder as they scrolled through TripAdvisor suggestions. When he saw the right choice Phichit grinned and, without really thinking about it, put his arm around Yurio to squeeze his shoulder in excitement. Yurio stiffened, but didn’t push away. “We’re going here!”

***

Yurio tried to act cool, but Phichit could tell that he was getting excited as they paid the aquarium admission. “Where are the sharks?” he said as soon as they got to the first room past the front desk, which turned out to be a softly lit hallway displaying fish and underwater fauna native to Canada. Yurio didn’t seem to be impressed by them.

“Haven’t you ever been to a zoo? They don’t put all the most exciting big animals that people want to see right at the beginning. Start slow!” Phichit nudged Yurio with his elbow, and was rewarded with the furious flaring of Yurio’s nostrils.

“That’s stupid.” Yurio leaned in close to the tank in front of him, which featured a school of pink and silver nondescript-looking fish swimming around in seaweed. His hands were still jammed in the pockets of his jacket, and Phichit could see his fists twisting in the bunched fabric. “This was a stupid idea.” 

“Yuuri told me you’d say that.” Phichit hadn’t mentioned their aquarium outing to Yuuri yet, but the lie paid off in spades as Yurio whirled around to sputter at him.

“That asshole thinks he knows everything about me! Katsudon doesn’t know shit.” Yurio leaned into Phichit’s space so that his snarl was just centimeters away, close enough that Phichit found himself noticing the distinctly purple shade of Yurio’s eyebags. His eyes were bloodshot, too, and in general he did not look like someone who’d won a gold medal two days ago. He reminded Phichit more of Yuuri in the days leading up to his first Grand Prix, before he’d placed sixth.

Phichit hooked his elbow through Yurio’s, walking them forward. “Cheer up, Yurio! You could be on a stuffy plane right now, but instead you get to learn about Canada’s aquarian ecology.” He held up his phone and snapped another selfie of them. The blue and green lights from the tanks in the background made their faces look super unique and cool, no filter needed.

“I’d prefer the airplane,” Yurio grumbled, but he didn’t unlink their arms, and this time he didn’t demand to vet the photo before Phichit posted it. 

Yuri Plisetsky’s narrative for this season was all about taking back his crown after coming in silver to Yuuri at last year’s Grand Prix Final. He’d been skating with a voracious openness that reporters loved, claiming that this was Plisetsky “letting loose”, “back with a vengeance,” “centered again with a more mature vision.” It was really something, seeing him on the ice: when talent like that uncoiled, you lost your breath, you didn’t think about competing against it, you just let something beautiful flow through you for the space of a routine. Phichit was proud of himself that he _had_ competed: he was leaving Toronto with a silver medal, or at least he would once this storm cleared. 

Faced with all that fierce hunger and artistry, it was easy to forget that Yuri’s eighteenth birthday was in March. He was a skater first and teenager second, but he was still a teenager, and from the barely perceptible way he leaned into Phichit as they walked past a tank of parrot fishes, he was exhausted and anxious.

Phichit never thought of himself as much of a caretaker, more likely to take pictures of his friends or doodle on them with sharpies when they got too drunk than to fold them into cabs and tuck them into bed. Not that he didn’t look after people when they needed it, but it wasn’t part of his self-image. And he wasn’t a member of the little circle of people that had, consciously or not, appointed themselves as on-the-road-family for figure skating’s resident unpredictable prodigy: Viktor, Yuuri, Otabek, Mila. One of them would be better suited to help Yurio handle the stress comedown from his latest gold. 

“Let’s get lunch,” Phichit said. “Lunch, then sharks.”

Phichit insisted on paying, which seemed to confuse Yurio but he didn’t hesitate before devouring his hamburger. Phichit tried to be surreptitious about watching him while he ate his own lunch. Yurio was remarkably unself-conscious in everything he did, from eating to walking to yelling at people, like it simply didn’t occur to him to question himself. This probably wasn’t a quality Phichit would have noticed if years of friendship with Yuuri hadn’t made him aware of the other extreme, of how self-conscious it was possible for a person to be in all things. 

Yuuri, once, had remarked on Phichit’s own lack of self-consciousness. “You make everything look so easy,” he’d said, while they were getting tipsy watching youtube videos together, barely a year into training in Detroit. Phichit had been baffled at the time, but now he understood that some people moved through the world with a hyper-awareness, double and triple layers of observation and analysis and worry preceding and following every action they took. It seemed exhausting.

“Your free skate performance was pretty incredible. You deserved that score, and the gold.” Phichit propped his chin on his hand and leaned over to take one of Yurio’s fries, a movement that Yurio’s eyes tracked with some hostility. 

Yurio set his burger down and rubbed grease off his chin. “Yeah,” he said suspiciously. “Uh, I mean thanks.”

“You’re welcome!” Phichit winked, ratcheting up Yurio’s suspicious confusion by several degrees. “Are you going to be working to improve any elements before the Grand Prix?”

“Why would I talk to you about that!”

“I wasn’t aware we were american football players. Worried I’ll steal your playbook?” 

“What the fuck are you talking about?”

Apparently training from a young age to be Russia’s next great figure skating hope didn’t leave much room for international cultural literacy. Phichit smirked. “Forget it. My point is, I was just trying to make conversation, not looking for points to possibly sabotage you.” He steepled his fingers under his chin. “At least, that’s what I’m saying to your face, but who knows if I can really be trusted. It could all be a scheme.”

“Fuck off.” Yurio threw a fry at Phichit’s head, but there was a small, begrudging smile on his face. “My second step sequence could use more work, I guess. But I’m going to keep pushing to make the whole thing even better. How about you? The quad in your short program?”

“Very tactful, pointing out my mistakes when I just told you your skating was incredible.” Yurio winced, but Phichit was still smiling. “Yes, my quad salchow is still shaky. But I’ve found it rarely helps me to obsess over one jump. It knocks me off-kilter, mentally, and even if I’ve managed to slightly improve a jump I couldn’t land before, the rest of the routine suffers.” 

Yurio looked revolted by the concept of maintaining balance rather than throwing himself obsessively into rigorous improvement of one skill like it was a dragon to be slain. But maybe he cared about keeping their time together friendly, because he was relatively polite, saying only “Yeah, I don’t work like that.”

“You don’t believe in focusing on the big picture of your skating in order to avoid burnout and manage stress?”

“I believe in practicing until I master whatever it is I need to do. What good is the big picture if I’m flubbing jumps?”

“Interesting. Where does rest and relaxation factor into that strategy?”

Yurio started and then glared, pointing a figure accusingly, having just figured out Phichit’s angle. “I don’t need advice on my training regimen from _you._ ”

Phichit ignored the implied insult in the way Yurio had said ‘you.’ He stole another french fry, prompting Yurio to lunge over the table and grab spinach leaves out of Phichit’s salad, just to be a dick. “You look like shit, Yurio. No offense. You do not look like someone who’s been getting the necessary rest and stress relief that someone training at your level needs.”

“ _You_ look like shit.” Very easy to shrug off such an obvious lie. “And, whatever! Stress won’t matter when I’m at the top again.”

“Okay Tyra Banks. I shouldn’t have to tell you about the dangers of overworking yourself.” 

“Ugh, mind your own business.” Yurio crossed his arms over his chest, pouting, done with his lunch. Phichit had to resist the urge to reach over and pat his shoulder consolingly; the hand might get bitten clean off.

“Come on, let’s go find the shark tank!” Yuri’s bitching was comparatively mild as he let Phichit drag him out of his cafeteria chair, and Phichit gave his arm a squeeze as they head back to the fish tanks. It was kind of hard to tell with Yurio, when you’d actually crossed a line with him vs. his baseline state of pissed off with the whole world including you, but he didn’t seem to be sulking after Phichit’s attempts at giving advice. He leaned into it every time Phichit put an arm around his shoulders for selfie purposes, and Phichit suspected that the increase in shoves, light punches and rude jostling was Yurio’s way of expressing physical affection.

The aquarium had been an inspired choice; the shark hall was wonderful. Phichit felt calmer and less drained with water all around them, meditative music playing over the speakers and hammerhead and tiger sharks swimming lazily over their heads. Phichit thought again about stress and burnout. He could do with taking some of the advice he’d given Yurio. His silver medal at Skate Canada meant that he’d earned a spot at the Grand Prix three years in a row, and he _needed_ to see himself up on that podium this time. He wasn’t going to hate himself if he didn’t take home the gold, but he’d felt his desire to at least medal pulsing through his veins this whole season.

He’d been pushing himself hard. And it showed in his skating, he’d been landing quads for the first time in his career, but he didn’t want to be careless and end up with an injury or a breakdown if he couldn’t achieve what he wanted. 

Phichit had his second great idea of the day while leafing through an aquarium brochure as he waited for Yurio to finish communing with the tiger sharks. “I’m not doing that,” Yurio declared immediately when Phichit showed him the program.

“Your voice says no, but your face says yes.” Yurio immediately schooled his features out of an interested, curious expression back to the signature scowl. “Come on, we both have our luggage so I know you have workout clothes with you. It’ll be fun!” 

Phichit eventually persuaded him by pointing out that he’d probably be the most flexible person there; predictably, Yurio couldn’t resist the idea of winning at something, including a yoga class. 

“And what else do you have planned after this?” Yurio asked sourly, one hand on his hip as they waited in their leggings for the instructor to arrive. Apparently aquarium yoga took place in the stingray chamber. “A mani/pedi appointment? Spa session? What other spa activities are you going to drag me to kicking and screaming?”

“Has anyone ever told you that you’re very dramatic?” That got him a soft punch in the arm, and Phichit laughed. “After this I want to go back to the hotel and stay there until it’s time to go back to the airport. But we could probably make manicures happen if you want.” They both knew that figure skating made pedicures immediately pointless.

“Whatever,” Yurio grumbled. But he wasn’t trying very hard to suppress a smile, and Phichit had to work to keep from giggling as Yurio started to show off his flexibility once the class started. Yurio was a little ridiculous and it was fun, it had been fun all day. Phichit was a bit surprised to find that he didn’t feel like he’d been babysitting, or drained from putting up with someone so ostensibly angry. Yurio liked Phichit, it was obvious, and most people liked Phichit, but that still wasn’t something he took for granted. Phichit liked him, too. 

Stingrays glided behind the instructor as she guided them through sun salutes. Phichit knew he should be meditating through the poses, but he was distracted by considerations of what Yurio might want to binge on netflix while they ate room service in Phichit’s hotel room later that night. He was absolutely confident that Yurio wouldn’t want to stop hanging out with him until they both flew out of the city.

**Author's Note:**

> The Toronto aquarium really does offer yoga classes in the stingray room.
> 
> I am zeegoesthere over on tumblr, please feel free to come say hi and talk to me about Yuri and Phichit :)


End file.
